Orchestras Canada

Again this week, we honour the programmers who successfully balance tradition and innovation in their seasonal concerts. Here’s a round-up of interesting-sounding programs from across the country:

December 15, 16 and 17, I Musici de Montreal (under the guest leadership of harpsichordist Joel Thiffault) presents a program of baroque and contemporary repertoire reflective of the season, as part of the orchestra’s series at Ogilvy’s. Among other delights, the program includes “Winter” from Vivaldi’s Four Seasons, a recent work by Michael Oesterle, and William Boyce’s Ode for the New Year 1756.

This Friday (December 16), the National Arts Centre Orchestra partners with composer/broadcaster/performer Andrew Craig, the Faith Chorale, and an impressive array of soloists that includes Jackie Richardson to present a Gospel Christmas Celebration.

This Friday night and Saturday afternoon (December 16 and 17), the Orchestre symphonique de Québec (led by Stéphane Laforest) presents La Grande Virée de Noel, featuring Gregory Charles, Marie-Josée Lord, Nicolas Pellerin and les Grands Hurleurs, and seven choirs from the region. The youth-oriented performances take place at the Pavillon de la Jeunesse at ExpoCité, and features not only seasonal carols but also a giant Karaoke and dance party with DJ Adam Doubleyou.

Saturday night (December 17), the Hamilton Philharmonic Orchestra (led by music director James Sommerville) presents a pair of seasonal programs featuring the internationally-renowned Toronto Mass Choir. There’s a shorter 2 p.m. concert, designed for families, as well as a full-length evening concert intended for an older audience.

December 17, the Lethbridge Symphony presents a traditional Christmas program with a twist: this year’s guest performers include not only the Bridge Bells bell ringing ensemble, but also Lethbridge’s MP (and a former member of the LSO violin section) Jim Hillyer, who will re-join the violin section for the evening. Speaking about the experience, Mr. Hillyer said, “I am looking forward to playing with the symphony once again. Over the years when I performed with the LSO I felt privileged to be able to get an inside seat for some amazing world class performances,” noting Elgar’s Cello Concerto, Tchaikovsky’s Violin Concerto, Gershwin’s Rhapsody in Blue, the Mozart Requiem, and Handel’s Messiah as particular highlights.

December 17 and 18, the Kamloops Symphony (led by Music Director Bruce Dunn) presents a pair of performances encapsulating what it describes as “a celebration of community that provides all the required ingredients for comfort and joy – stories, songs, young performers, warmth and fun!” Featured performers include soprano Carlene Wiebe (a member of the faculty of the Kamloops Symphony Music School), violist Madeleine Haynes (2011 winner of the Kamloops Symphony Award at the Kamloops Festival of the Performing Arts), baritone Aaron Durand, the KSO Chorus, and a number of students from the Kamloops Symphony Music School.

Sometimes we get media releases that simply make us happy – and so it was with this recent announcement from the Kamloops Symphony about a free concert they’re presenting on September 10 at the Sagebrush Theatre.

The concert is in honour of the late Dick Dickens, “the respected leader of a very successful band and choir program at Kamloops Senior Secondary School for many years, a volunteer conductor of the Kamloops Community Band, a sometimes outspoken member of the Kamloops School Board in his retirement, and a strong voice for the political causes that were important to him. Dick never married and had no children of his own. His family were his friends and colleagues, and he had a keen interest in keeping in touch with his former students. He also had a mischievous sense of humour that was often exhibited in the form of practical jokes. As if it wasn’t enough that he worked tirelessly at his teaching career and in the community throughout his life, Dick created a legacy through his will to provide support for his two passions – education and music – after his death.”

The concert will unite the Kamloops Symphony and the Kamloops Rube Band in an unlikely, humorous and entertaining mix of classical and band repertoire, polkas and marches. (Do click on the link: the sousaphone alone is worth the trip.) For more information, please visit kamloopssymphony.com.

Massive symphonic spectaculars are all very well, but sometimes it’s nice to hear smaller ensemble repertoire performed in an intimate environment. If you agree with this assertion, it’s a good week or so in Canada! Here are some chamber orchestra/chamber ensemble highlights from member orchestras.

The Windsor Symphony wraps up its 63rd concert season today, April 29, with a pair of performances of music by Bach and Telemann at Assumption University Chapel, led by harpsichordist/conductor Jeannette Sorrell of Cleveland’s Apollo’s Fire.

The Kamloops Symphony’s chamber music series wraps up tomorrow, April 30, with a program of music by Cesar Franck, Camille Saint-Saens, Vincent d’Indy, and Phillipe Gaubert, performed by KSO core professional musicians Catharine Dochstader (flute), Sally Arai (clarinet), Martin Kratky (cello) and guest Dimiter Terziev (piano).

The Saskatoon Symphony’s Chamber Orchestra series concludes this Saturday, April 30, with a program that celebrates the “spirit of a creative explosion, centred in Paris after the First World War, when traditional views on art, music, and writing were challenged and reshaped.” Works on the program include a pair of Gymnopédies by Erik Satie, Stravinsky’s Pulcinella, Harry Somers’ Picasso Suite and Respighi’s Gli Uccelli.

On May 5, the chamber orchestra of the Orchestre symphonique de Longueuil (led by Music Director Marc David) performs Boucherville composer Michel Massé’s Requiem pour Roxanne at the Sainte-Famille church in Boucherville. The work, “filled with light and serenity” is dedicated to the memory of the composer’s niece, who died from complications of cystic fibrosis at the age of 11.

On May 6, Musaeus, the core ensemble of the Lethbridge Symphony, presents a program entitled “Life Lessons”, including Britten’s Simple Symphony, Smetana’s String Quartet “From My Life”, and a work by J-P Christopher Jackson, a composer and musicologist long associated with the Department of Music at the University of Lethbridge, entitled Bromptons, An English Rhapsody. This last work features bass baritone John Conlon, and is based on an unfinished pastoral romance written by Brian Tyson, a bittersweet memory of one man’s youth.

Next Saturday, March 12, the Kamloops Symphony (led by Music Director Bruce Dunn) presents Similia, the duo of twin sisters Annie Labrie (guitar) and Nadia Labrie (flute) in concert with the orchestra. The program repeats in Salmon Arm the following afternoon.

The program includes a commissioned work by Canadian Patrick Roux entitled Concerto Tradicionuevo, Sarasate’s Zigeunerweisen in an arrangement for solo flute, and two ever-green works for orchestra: Michael Matthews’ Between the Wings of the Earth, and Prokofiev’s Classical Symphony. www.kamloopssymphony.com

We read a lot of media releases – and this month, we’re reading about a number of performances of new and tested works by Canadian composers. What’s caught our eye?

November 13, the Hamilton Philharmonic, led by Music Director James Sommerville, reprises last January’s successful premiere of the HPO-commissioned Black Sand by Kelly-Marie Murphy. On that same night, the Kamloops Symphony, led by Bruce Dunn, performs John Estacio’s Such Sweet Sorrow, for string orchestra.

November 15, the Ottawa Symphony Orchestra, led by David Currie, performs Oskar Morawetz’s Carnival Overture and Andrew P. MacDonald’s Violin Concerto, featuring Symphony Nova Scotia concertmaster Robert Uchida.

During “an ongoing search for a venue with the best acoustics possible, that also meets the needs of the audience and the performers”, the Kamloops Symphony’s Chamber Music Series continues on November 6 with its first performance in a new venue – the Kamloops Convention Centre Theatre. A quartet of Kamloops Symphony musicians – including Principal Cellist Martin Kratky, in his series debut – will perform a program they titled Anniversaries, that was chosen to highlight the birthdays of composers Bach and Schumann and the 50th anniversary of the death of composer Dohnányi.

The Kamloops Symphony has launched its new season, and, as the orchestra’s enthusiastic media release says:  ”Music Director Bruce Dunn has done it again! His twenty first season with the Kamloops Symphony is just as fresh and new as the first one was.”  The KSO’s program for 2010-11 includes a ten-concert classics series featuring “treasured Kamloops performers” and well-known Canadian soloists, a 6-concert chamber music series, and such special events as a recital by tenor Richard Margison, and a sing-along Messiah.  It’s a busy season – but that’s not all:  the KSO presents a three-concert series in Salmon Arm as well.  To learn more, please visit here.

On April 22, Aradia Ensemble (Kevin Mallon, director) will give a free hour-long lunch-time concert at Toronto’s Four Seasons Centre, featuring excerpts from Samuel Arnold’s Polly, written as a sequel to the composer’s highly successful The Beggar’s Opera.

Aradia’s recording of Polly, which will be released for sale at the concert, is a world premier recording.  Aradia Ensemble Director Kevin Mallon will be joined by Laura Albino as Polly, Marion Newman as Jenny Diver, Jason Nedecky as Ducat, Loralie Kirkpatrick as Trapes, Gillian Grossman as the Indian Scout, Sean Watson as Morano and introducing Kyra Folk- Farber as Mrs. Ducat.

This week, April 16 and 17, the Kamloops Symphony (under the direction of Bruce Dunn) will present a pair of Charlie Chaplin movies, complete with live accompaniment.  The films are The Rink and The Adventurer, and they’ve been freshly scored for smaller orchestra by Carl Davis.  As the KSO’s media release advises, “a large screen will fill the stage to provide a larger than life view of The Rink and The Adventurer. American composer Aaron Copland’s Music for the Theatre sets the stage for an evening of hilarity.”

Les Violons du Roy (led by principal guest conductor Jean-Marie Zeitouni, and featuring violinist Vadim Guzman) will present a dynamic and varied program of music from North and South America, tonight (April 16) at the Palais Montcalm.  Works include Chavez’s Toccata for percussion, Villa Lobos’s Bachianas brasileiras #9, two tangos by Piazzolla, Prevost’s Scherzo, Barber’s Adagio, and Bernstein’s Serenade for violin, strings and percussion.

From May 4 to 13, the Orchestre symphonique de Montreal (led by Music Director Kent Nagano) will present a comprehensive Beethoven festival that includes all nine symphonies, the Triple Concerto, and a new work by Booker Prize-winning author Yann Martel, narrated by Michel Dumont and set to the ballet music from Creatures of Prometheus.  Featured soloists in the “Triple” are James Ehnes, violin; Antonio  Meneses, cello; and Menahem Pressler, piano.

The Edmonton Symphony Orchestra (ESO) has announced a four-year extension of William Eddins’ contract as Music Director. Presently in his fifth season at the helm of the orchestra with one year remaining on his current contract, this extension will see Eddins conducting the ESO through the 2014-2015 season. This partnership, which began in September 2005, will mark a significant and stable period of artistic leadership for Eddins and the ESO. Since the professional establishment of the orchestra in 1952, only one other ESO Music Director reached the 10-year tenure, that being Uri Mayer, who held the position for 13 seasons, from 1981-1994.

Nurhan Arman, Music Director of Sinfonia Toronto, has announced the appointment of Canadian composer Heather Schmidt as the orchestra’s Composer-in-Residence for the 2009-2010 season.  In making the announcement Maestro Arman said, “I am thrilled that Heather Schmidt will be closely involved with us this year. I am looking forward to leading the world premieres of her new Piano Concerto and a Cello Concerto that she is writing for us, and working on many other projects together throughout the season. This appointment re-emphasizes Sinfonia Toronto’s commitment to Canadian composers.”
 
Earlier this week, Executive Director Katherine Carleton presented the first of this year’s Orchestras Canada Betty Webster Awards to Tafelmusik Baroque Orchestra, at the opening of their Toronto season of concerts.  The festivities continue in October, when award winners Kathy Humphreys (General Manager of the Kamloops Symphony) and Jeff Alexander (President and CEO of the Vancouver Symphony Orchestra) will be presented with their awards.  We are proud to salute these leading citizens in the Canadian orchestral community!

The Toronto Symphony Orchestra has announced that Jennifer MacDonald will join the TSO Music Department as Artist Liaison/Assistant to Artistic Administration.  Jennifer comes directly to the TSO from Ottawa where, for the past two seasons, she has been Artistic Administrator of the highly successful Ottawa Chamber Music Society.  She holds a Bachelors degree in Music (piano) from Mount Allison and a Masters in Musicology from McGill.